FIRO

New research sends clear message to team leaders

In this post we explore practical strategies for improving team communication and recommend tips to improve how team members interact on the job.

In this post, based on an interview with Myers-Briggs Professional Services Principal Consultant and Depth Psychologist Dr. Marta Koonz, we discuss communication in teams, the psychological needs of teams, and their impact on collaboration.

In the ever-evolving landscape of HR and training and development, organizations are recognizing the significance of assessments in unlocking individual and team potential. Among these assessments, the Fundamental Interpersonal Relations Orientation^™ (FIRO^®) assessment stands out as a powerful tool for team development and leadership growth.

In this episode of The Myers-Briggs Company Podcast, we’re joined by Dr. Marta Koonz, Principal Consultant for The Myers-Briggs Company, as she walks us through insights around using psychological needs to better work relationships and improve teamwork.

Overestimating progress is one of the barriers to an inclusive culture

Working from home presents both opportunities and challenges. A basic understanding of interpersonal needs from the perspective of the FIRO-B® assessment can provide insights that can lead to a deeper understanding of your own interpersonal needs and those of your team. 

There are three types of conflict that people experience at work. Fortunately, HR professionals, leadership consultants, and executive coaches can help leaders and employees improve their conflict resolution skills with the FIRO-B^® assessment.

Did you know that interpersonal behaviors can be measured in an objective way? Through the FIRO-B® assessment, HR professionals and leadership consultants can check how well a person’s behaviors cultivate inclusion and success in the workplace.

Inclusion in the workplace gives people a voice and drives performance. And the FIRO-B assessment can help your people understand how their interpersonal behaviors are tied to company culture and inclusivity.

Paying closer attention to employee needs is the way to make remote, in-office, and hybrid teams function better

Dr. Martin Boult shares his expertise on leadership and connection in this episode of The Myers-Briggs Company Podcast.

If not, you might be part of a hybrid strategy that’s about to fail.

As employees return to the office, they’re expecting more flexibility in their social contracts with employers. How can HR help?

For diversity to thrive, inclusion is a must.

How FIRO helps people to build trust in their relationships, improve morale and reduce stress in the workplace.

Change is inevitable. And as the hybrid workplace becomes a new normal for many organizations, it brings specific benefits and challenges to managing uncertainty and successfully implementing change initiatives.

Is it possible to get the best of both worlds with hybrid work?

Teams and Google’s Project Aristotle

It must be love

Did you miss some of the most popular content from last year?

Looking for an easy to implement icebreaker? Bingo!

How the FIRO tool adds so much value to any MBTI coaching session

What the FIRO questionnaire can tell us about interpersonal compatibility

A great exercise for groups or teams - download the instructions and cards for free.

I am coaching the CEO of a large charity. He’s 55 and has been in his job for nine years. He looks grey and anxious, slumping in his chair. “I’m tired of my team treating me like their parent. It’s hard enough being a parent at home. I’m exhausted, our funding is under threat, I don’t think I want to do this job any more”. He tells me readily that he’s been what he calls ‘psychometrified’ many times; but he’s never taken the FIRO- B assessment...

As an OPP Consultant, I work with many teams across a wide variety of sectors and industries. I was recently talking to a client, herself an L&D practitioner, who asked me about my approach to team coaching – in  particular what my ‘top tips’ were for ensuring that the work had impact and made a real difference to how the team functions. This got me thinking about the key elements involved.

Visits to our Personality Matters blog were at an all-time high in 2014, and we covered a wide range of topics in our weekly posts. Over the last 12 months we've talked about the best MBTI-based books and the various resources available for L&D teams. We’ve promoted Movember, and we’ve commented on the Paul Flowers furore. We've also continued to thrive as thought leaders in a diverse range of workplace psychology issues, from recruitment and assessment centres to polarity management. But what are the top five posts that readers have returned to again and again?

To celebrate the launch of the new shop we thought it would be useful to highlight the most popular resources that have been purchased through our online ordering during 2014. These are the items that our customers find most useful (along with the many popular reports ordered by practitioners via OPPassessment). How many of them are in your portfolio of essential resources?

Like most people, throughout my life I have seen relationships that work and others that don’t. When they don’t work, often it’s because people’s interpersonal needs are not being met or they are in conflict. For example, if someone has High Expressed Control and Low Wanted Control and is working with someone who has the same interpersonal need, someone is not going to get to express control at the level he or she wants. At the same time, one person may be expressing control much more than the other person wants. The challenge is when people don’t understand what is motivating their behaviour or the behaviour of another person. Why is this important? Seeking to understand that motivation can assist an individual in choosing more effective behaviour.

Understanding personality type helps us see how our minds are wired - how we like to get energised, take in information, make decisions, and orient ourselves to the outer world. Understanding interpersonal needs gives us insight into another aspect of our personality - what motivates our behaviour in regard to how much interaction we want with others.

In my ten years’ experience of working with teams at all levels in organisations, I’ve found the FIRO® tool one of the best ways to accelerate a team’s development. It’s a catalyst for the transition from a group of individuals working well (or badly!) to a team that has common objectives and drive, and team members who understand the journey they need to take to become high performing. Once they’ve experienced FIRO, team members are often more able to discuss openly what they need from each other to support the team and share resources, becoming less territorial and more collaborative. What I love about FIRO is that it really gets to the core of what’s driving people and their interactions with each other.